Is Trump Becoming Putin? (Robert Wright & Nikita Petrov)
Episode description
0:28 Bob welcomes Nikita back to the Nonzero team 6:41 WSJ's report on Trump's authoritarian drift 9:10 Three levers: streets, media, education system 13:22 Trump the businessman and Trump the politician 15:14 Why Putin was compelling in 1999, when Russia was a young democracy 23:01 Laws vs norms 29:29 Trump and lawfare: how independent is the US judiciary? 36:16 Partisanship among judges 38:52 Trump's view of the world as a game 43:08 Cynicism as a political brand 46:34 Nikita: Putin and Trump share a geopolitical worldview 50:10 The damage the US and Russia did to the international law 54:59 The evolution of Putin's understanding of geopolitics 59:46 Today's Overtime segment is open for everybody! 1:00:53 The crisis of the nation-state & NonZero's community building project 1:18:31 "Kremlin is not Russia": distinguishing between the nation and the state 1:19:59 Bob: We all need a tribe 1:24:56 What does it mean to be an American? 1:30:07 Nikita's Armenian propaganda: A legitimate reason to be proud of your nation
Robert Wright (Nonzero, The Evolution of God, Why Buddhism Is True) and Nikita Petrov (https://psychopolitica.substack.com). Recorded August 28, 2025.
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